I blogged a while back about not having the ability to easily disable purchasing on the Kindle. Until recently we managed ok, but then my youngest child started clicking on the ‘not-free’ games to the tune of about $100 in a day. I can live with the occasional $1.99 purchase, but those $19.99 games add up fast!

I had to browse a bit on the Amazon site but finally found an instant chat feature for customer service and in just a few minutes they refunded the purchases. I asked about the parental controls again and it turns out there was an update to the OS that gives more control:

With the latest software update available for Kindle Fire, you can enable Parental Controls to restrict access to the different content libraries on your device (for example: music, video, books), restrict Wi-Fi and Internet access, and restrict purchase and download access. To enable Parental Controls on your Kindle Fire, tap the Quick Settings icon, then More, then Parental Controls, then switch Enable Parental Controls to the ON position. Follow the onscreen instructions to set a Parental Controls password. You”ll then see the options to enable various Parental Control settings.

I followed the instructions and dug into the controls,one of the options is to require a password for purchases. It works,just not the way I want it to work. It requires a password for any purchase, even the “Free” ones, and I don’t really want to enter the password every time they want a new free game. I’ll try it for a while and see.